1. Field of the Invention
The invention is directed to a valve for a vibration damper comprising a valve housing and a valve slide movable in the valve housing for at least partially closing at least one flow path of a fluid flowing through the valve, the valve having an input side and an output side.
2. Description of the Prior Art
It is known to use valves in vibration dampers. In two-tube vibration dampers, there is usually a base valve at a bottom of the working cylinder. Further, the piston can have a piston valve. In this case, the valves are compression valves.
It is further known, e.g., from DE 34 34 877 A1, to provide two-tube dampers with an adjustable damping force in that a damping force generating device outside of the two-tube damper is fluidically connected to the interior of the two-tube damper. The resistance to the fluid can be adjusted at this damping valve to control the damping force of the vibration damper.
To produce damping valves of this type more economically, it is necessary to limit the volume flow through the damping valve. Of course, flow valves for influencing the flow of a fluid are already known. In particular, there are two-way flow control valves, three-way flow control valves, or flow-dividing valves. Known flow valves cannot be utilized for the targeted application in a vibration damper because they are either electrically operated or, by reason of their manner of operation, cannot be controlled purely as a function of volume flow.
A vibration damper with adjustable damping force in which an additional damping valve is arranged upstream of an adjustable damping valve is known from DE 102004054474 B3. In this way, suddenly occurring maximum pressures, for example when driving over a bump, can be contained and kept away from the adjustable damping valve.